Preserving & Respecting History- I don't think so!

[malcolm]

I used to think that we were good at preserving History i.e National Trust, English Heritage, Listing Buildings etc. Now I am not sure that we really care.
We are quite prepared to sell our heritage for conversion into flats, flatten & move graves or the curbstones almost at will, dispose of items to the highest bidder & generally take our dogs to leave their deposits anywhere we please, demolish anything that might cost a few pounds to renovate.

Full marks to the War Graves Commission for setting the standards in preservation and respect.

The government are bringing new legislation forward concerning 'National Treasures' and the preservation etc - but the contents - do not appear to be so well covered.

Much of the 'paper records' are being scanned and put onto Cd's/DVDs into order that they are not lost in a fire or other catastrophe but who really cares - until it's is not there!

Malcolm

[ajp1963]

I totally agree Malcolm,in todays society respect is a word or indeed action that dosnt seem to happen very often.
And as my 13 year old son said to me the other day as i helped him with his history web page that a great crime was committed during the 1960`s ie all the beautiful buildings this town and indeed counrty has lost due to money,greed and total dissrespect for our past.
He is a firm believer in you cant go forward with your future if you dont know your past.
Far to many people think someone else will act and save this,save that,so as you have started this thread i would like to offer our help in any way we can to help save our past.

Regards

Andy and Lewis

[malcolm]

I now have over 19,000 Monuments photgraphed across Keighley and District and I would say that less than 10% have any signs of being cared for, 30% have been laid flat for understandable safety reasons, another 20% damaged, either accidentally or deliberately, and the rest are in reasonable order.

Many Churchyards, Cemeteries and Burial Grounds are partially maintained, and there are a few well kept ones, but allowing deterioration of the remainder is only storing trouble for the future. Levels of the ground sink and no-one can be bothered to fill them up, 'lets let the grass grow - it'll be alright'. 'We can't afford it'. 'No-one is bothered'. 'We haven't time'

The old adage is still true - "There never enough time to do it right - but there will always be time to do it twice" - when an accident happens.

I really don't know what the solution is likely to be, but I am doing my bit to try and ensure that on any given day I recorded the exact condition of a monument. Whether my photos will be preserved or, like most other things, discarded in the fullness of time, I cannot say, but I did try.

Any one got any ideas?

Malcolm

[lawkholmelaner]

I wish I understood fully what would be the desired outcome of these sincerely held concerns. In order that our further support may be enlisted, please tell us what is at risk and how - and what we can do to support.

[pjd]

As one who has stuggled through the undergrowth & fallen stones in searching for my ancestors' graves in Dockroyd Cemetery (unsuccessful) & Slack Lane Baptist Cemetery (partially successful) I totally agree with you Malcolm - hurrah for the transcriptions & the photos you have taken are a great resource!
What about a Keighley FHS &/or LHS work party to do some clearing?
Unfortunately I live in Somerset but could try to fit in with my regular visits to family

[Andy Wade]

The owner of Dockroyd Graveyard has just been served with a Planning Enforcement Order regarding the demolition of the front entrance wall to the graveyard, which he took down despite a covenant expressly forbidding anything like this.
We in Oakworth are going to have to work very hard to ensure this developer doesn't do anything else. He has already felled many trees straight down on to headstones and broken several of them and now this with the front wall and gates.
He bought the graveyard for £3,500 from the Methodist church who I have to say were naive in the extreme and as far as we can tell never even offered it to anyone else. Keighley Town Council would have happily bought it and allowed a trust to be set up to preserve it, Oakworth Village Society would have supported it, and I would gladly have gone and got a swift bank loan in order to save this graveyard. The sale price was a pittance.
What price our heritage? In this case it was just £3,500.
It sickens me to see that one unscrupulous person can destroy our heritage with impunity in a conservation area and unless we are very lucky indeed, he will get away with it.

At the moment our only hope lies with the CoBMDC Planning Office as the Methodist Church seem very reluctant to take this developer to court.
If anyone has any ideas or support I'd be very interested to hear from them.
Ideally we'd like everyone to write separately to the Methodist Church. Not to lambast them but to plead and add support for them to take action against this developer whom they made sign a covenant at the time of sale. When it comes to enforcing it they need to see the resolve of people who would like to see action taken against the developer.

I'm reminded of a quotation that goes something like this:
"All it takes for evil to triumph is for a good man to do nothing"
Probably not precisely the original quotation but I hope you all get the idea.
We need to make a stand.

And one of the items on the covenant that the developer has broken?
He agreed to keep it neat and tidy and not cause any difficulty to anyone who wished to visit graves.
I think pjd would agree with me that the developer has certainly breached that part of the covenant.

[lawkholmelaner]

What is the address of the Methodist Church where on would find an officer/official who might be responsive to such an appeal?

[Andy Wade]

Sept 27, 2008 22:06:48 GMT lawkholmelaner said:

What is the address of the Methodist Church where on would find an officer/official who might be responsive to such an appeal?

I'd say it would be best sending letters or emails to Superintendent Minister Rev. John Hudson who I'm informed is fully aware of the issues surrounding this matter.
His contact details may be found on this webpage:

www.keighleymethodists.org/CctStaff.php


I'd also like to add that for anyone who hasn't heard of this story, there's an article on page 4 of the Keighley News dated Thursday 25th September 2008.

Or you can read it here:

www.keighleynews.co.uk/news/3700259.Fury_as_cemetery_wall_is_demolished/

Edit:
I thought I'd add this as an example of the profit he wishes to make on this land. He wants £75,000 for a 10m x 7.5 m plot without planning permission having been granted - they describe it as having potential when the developers planning appeal was turned down at the highest level:

www.homesandproperty.co.uk/sale/yorkshire-and-the-humber/west-yorkshire/oakworth/-property-sale/14441-181569.html

And that doesn't include the rest of the graveyard.
I fear his ultimate plan may be to flatten the lot and build houses on all the land. However long it may take.

[malcolm]

Without wishing to personalise this - I would expect other laws to come into play should there be an attempt to build on or over graves. Exhumation orders would be required and clearly there has to be very good reasons -

Quote from Department of Constitutional Affairs Website -

"Exhumation
It is an offence to exhume buried remains unless, in general terms, either a licence has been issued by the Secretary of State, or a faculty obtained where the remains are buried in land consecrated according to the rites of the Church of England. If a burial ground is to be developed for other purposes, prior exhumation of the remains may be compulsory, and their disposal subject to the Secretary of State's directions (if the development does not involve disturbance of the remains, the need to remove them may be dispensed with).

Anyone wishing to arrange for the removal of buried remains, including cremated remains, may apply to us for an exhumation licence. Anyone contemplating the development of a site containing buried remains is urged to contact us beforehand for advice on the applicable legislation and procedure for the site in question. Anyone disturbing buried remains accidentally is advised to leave the remains in place and to contact us immediately."

Regretably - Oxenhope 'New Burial Ground' -junction of Jew Lane & Denholme Road currently Methodist owned - is in a worse state than Dockroyd - At least Dockroyd does have the trees /Bushes felled however badly done.

It is the general lack of care by anyone concerning Burial grounds that distresses me - We don't have enough funds in the Various Lottery Funds to help sort out the problems locally - never mind nationally.

Malcolm

[Andy Wade]

Sept 28, 2008 1:10:47 GMT malcolm said:

Without wishing to personalise this - I would expect other laws to come into play should there be an attempt to build on or over graves. Exhumation orders would be required and clearly there has to be very good reasons -

Quote from Department of Constitutional Affairs Website -

"Exhumation
It is an offence to exhume buried remains unless, in general terms, either a licence has been issued by the Secretary of State, or a faculty obtained where the remains are buried in land consecrated according to the rites of the Church of England. If a burial ground is to be developed for other purposes, prior exhumation of the remains may be compulsory, and their disposal subject to the Secretary of State's directions (if the development does not involve disturbance of the remains, the need to remove them may be dispensed with).
Anyone wishing to arrange for the removal of buried remains, including cremated remains, may apply to us for an exhumation licence. Anyone contemplating the development of a site containing buried remains is urged to contact us beforehand for advice on the applicable legislation and procedure for the site in question. Anyone disturbing buried remains accidentally is advised to leave the remains in place and to contact us immediately."

One part of the original planning application for Dockroyd would have placed a 7 metre wide path and road across 18 of the graves, meaning that the headstones would have been removed.
I know it is 18 because I went in with a copy of the plan and a tape measure and counted them.
Now there were many objections to the plan but I should stress that in the final inspectors report which rejected the application there was no mention of an objection to the road in principle.
Effectively they would have just gone over the graves.
The inspector did mention that they had considered the overlap between site and graveyard,(meaning the proposed road). They did not object to the road, just where it came out on to Dockroyd Lane and the accompanying traffc problems with that. They noted that the wall would have still been mostly intact.

I've also heard that the original 100 year rule has now been reduced to 50 years before development may be considered on an existing cemetery. Perhaps someone could confirm this? The last burial in Dockroyd was in 1976 (I think). This means it is now 32 years old. Only 18 years left to go for Dockroyd if the 50 year rule rumour is true.

Sept 28, 2008 1:10:47 GMT malcolm said:

Regretably - Oxenhope 'New Burial Ground' -junction of Jew Lane & Denholme Road currently Methodist owned - is in a worse state than Dockroyd - At least Dockroyd does have the trees /Bushes felled however badly done.

I agree, I've been in Oxenhope burial ground and come out covered in green slime and cobwebs. At least the graves seem to be mostly intact.
The problem with Dockroyd is that it is now in private ownership. As a result of the clearance and no further action being taken to tidy the area, more trees are on their way up as the leaf canopy has been removed. It's dotted with sycamore saplings, most appear to be growing out of the tree stumps left behind from the felling. Couple this with the accelerated growth of ivy and brambles and access to the graves is nigh on impossible.
At least 12 gravestones were damaged in the original felling. There may be more but access is very restricted now.

Sept 28, 2008 1:10:47 GMT malcolm said:

It is the general lack of care by anyone concerning Burial grounds that distresses me - We don't have enough funds in the Various Lottery Funds to help sort out the problems locally - never mind nationally.

Again, I agree. However, the plan to save Dockroyd graveyard would have been to apply for a Community Spaces Grant and possibly even a land food grant which could have seen a memorial garden and planting beds with dwarf fruit trees and bee hives. This would have allowed children to visit to learn about history and to help produce food from the land. There was/is space in Dockroyd graveyard for this. Having looked very carefully at grant applications the consensus is that we would be eligible if we linked in with Oakworth Primary School and the Oakworth in Bloom Group which are in general support of the plan.
The main thing is that people have with the will to do this and this may be where History Societies could come into their own.

[pjd]

I am appalled at the demolition of the entrance to Dockroyd Cemetery & more generally at the arrogance & greed of some developers who believe themselves to be above planning regulations & indeed the law. Surely there is some means of insisting on the reinstatement of the wall and gates? - ever the optimist - but I guess the stone is earmarked for another project (must be worth a fair bit) & the gates residing in a skip somewhere, long gone before the powers that be can enforce any restoration.
And what about the condition of sale re maintenance of the cemetery? Was this a legal arrangement (covenant) or just a 'gentleman's' agreement?
I will also be making my feelings known to the Methodist contact given - thanks
Jill

[Andy Wade]

Sept 28, 2008 11:43:36 GMT pjd said:

I am appalled at the demolition of the entrance to Dockroyd Cemetery & more generally at the arrogance & greed of some developers who believe themselves to be above planning regulations & indeed the law. Surely there is some means of insisting on the reinstatement of the wall and gates? - ever the optimist - but I guess the stone is earmarked for another project (must be worth a fair bit) & the gates residing in a skip somewhere, long gone before the powers that be can enforce any restoration.
And what about the condition of sale re maintenance of the cemetery? Was this a legal arrangement (covenant) or just a 'gentleman's' agreement?
I will also be making my feelings known to the Methodist contact given - thanks
Jill

The stone was taken away by the contractor in part payment for the demolition. He was reminded that as a contractor working in a conservation area that the onus was on him to make sure that relevant permissions were in place before starting demolition and that he could not claim to be an innocent party. He was also warned to keep the stone safe until the matter had been resolved. He said he would keep it at his yard for now.
We're quite worried about the gates though. We don't know what damage they suffered during removal.

My understanding is that the arrangement at sale was a legal covenant - I have a copy of some parts of it here.
The Methodist Church either does not have the will to take action (they did nothing after the gravestones were broken during tree felling) or they're waiting to see what action the Planning Office takes. There is an Enforcement Order on the developer, but I haven't found out the full details of that yet. A Planning Officer first ordered them to stop work when they first started demolition on Thursday 18th September but at 7.30 am on Saturday 20th September they just went ahead and pulled the whole wall down and took it away.
You may think it would be hard to infer anything other than this being a deliberate action on the part of the developer knowing full well that the Planning Office was closed for the weekend. I couldn't possibly comment.

[malcolm]

It does appear that English Heritage is becoming concerned about the loss of 'historical graveyard/cemeteries' to neglect and developers and is holding a meeting on Oxford about this issue.
The potential and actual loss to social, local & family history is becoming very worrying to them.
I am trying to obtain information from English Heritage, although it is unlikely to help in the short term.

M

[Andy Wade]

Hi Malcolm,

A couple of years ago I actually looked into the likelihood of English Heritage designating Dockroyd graveyard but found that their criteria were mostly based around graveyard buildings rather than the graves and the cemeteries, except in some cases. As Dockroyd doesn't have a building attached it didn't meet their criteria unless there was something special about it historically. Unfortunately no one famous is buried in Dockroyd.
I had heard that English Heritage were looking at cemeteries again and eagerly await developments. I would love to see it scheduled as it would add a further control on this developer.
Rumour has it he's spreading the hardcore base at the top in order to create a hard standing for a traveller's caravan. Whilst I could easily be outraged at that, I won't be surprised if it turns out to be true.

[barcroftlad]

Full marks to you good people who are trying to preserve our history. I too have struggled through Dock Royd cemetry a couple of years ago looking for my great grans grave. I'm not sure if she was buried there or the other Oakworth cemetry, but I was appalled at it's condition. When I read about the purchase of the cemetry by a developer I couln't believe it. First, what is the Methodist Church about if it can sell off the resting place of loved ones and of course the other question is what sort of a character is this developer? New Zealand has lots of these characters/developers who are going broke rapidly with the financial crisis. Maybe we can get lucky with this chap.
What happened to the gates? Are they able to be reinstated if the people power are successful? Good luck.

[Andy Wade]

Oct 11, 2008 22:11:04 GMT barcroftlad said:

What happened to the gates? Are they able to be reinstated if the people power are successful? Good luck.

The developer and the contractor have both been served with a notice by the Planning Officer. I'm not sure of the wording of the notice, but it is at least that they have not to do any further work until planning permission has been obtained.
The contractor who took down the wall and the gates has been told that he must not dispose of them and gave a verbal agreement in front of a witness that he would store them in his yard. Whether or not he will actually do that remains to be seen.

Since the stop notice was served, three loads of hardcore have been tipped and spread about on the site. Who knows what will happen next.